Great Tie Alert

Well played, Lee Hazlewood!

FOULARD: sign of quality

Foulard knots his foulard

How does Foulard tie his tie?  I know you've been wondering just how he does it.  Well, here's the knot I use most often--The Shelby (or Pratt) :

It gives you a neat, symmetrical, tidy knot, with a minimum of effort.  I found it years ago, and have pretty much stuck to it.  I make an exception with some vintage ties I own, because they're shorter than 2011-era ties.  For those, I use the classic four-in-hand.

I wear ties with a width between 2.5 and 3.25 inches, but 2.75 or 3 inches is the ideal width.  I like the point of the tie's blade to go just over my belt buckle, but not too far, because I think over-long ties look even worse than over-short ones.

I have a couple of tie bars--a shorter and longer one.  The one I use depends on the width of the tie.  Sometimes I'll use a binder clip from the office as a secret behind-the-tie way of clipping it to my shirt's placket, if I don't want to be so flashy.

Dig it!

Tintin, knitted

What every adult man needs

A pocket square rack--gives your dresser that 'my bedroom is a department store' look.  Only $65.

I once passed on the opportunity to buy a vintage rooster™ ties store display somewhat like the rack above, but with a plastic rooster head at the top. In a rare moment of practicality, I decided it would be too expensive and difficult to fly it home (I was in Indiana at the time).

Green-o

Isn't this a lovely tie?  It's a mid-sixties Brooks Brothers green paisley number just under 3 inches in width.  I've been on a paisley kick lately, so I've been picking them up cheap on Ebay.  Green is one of the most elusive tie colors, which makes this one extra-interesting.  I haven't bid on this one, since it's above my target price (which is around ten bucks).  For some reason, the seller has categorized it as "1950 50S Rockabilly Skinny", which is not accurate.

Visually, it speaks to me of an era where a guy would naturally wear a tie on ordinary occasions, but wants to show that he's a hip dude, so it's an unusually-colored groovy pattern.  This same guy might also be sporting some modest sideburns to show that he's not uptight (even if he is).  It's a perfect moment in time--attuned to cultural changes, but not fully given in to the slobby excess of the seventies.

Mad Menned again

The Mad Men blog has updated their Mad Men Yourself feature, so I've re-done mine again for fun. Here I be:

As you can see, I'm enjoying an Old Fashioned with Don Draper. Note my gold blazer, green turtleneck, and dark slacks--I'm being casual!
(click on the picture for a large version, if you care!)

Foulard's Ideal Evening of TV

Why can't we have shows about middle-aged guys in suits on TV anymore?

Well played, Pete!

A-seasonally, Mad Men has started at Thanksgiving 1964 this year, and last night's episode was set at Christmas. I'm not going into any spoiler-ish stuff here, but just wanted to point out Pete Campbell's snazzy red narrow-lapel double-breasted blazer, which he's sporting at the office Xmas party. Pete normally wears a blue suit to work, but this is the kid of thing a stylish guy of that time period would pull out of the closet to attend a social function or go out on the town.

Now, of course, no one would wear anything like that in public. I actually have one like this in gold, with big, shiny flat gold buttons and a colorfully patterned lining. But even for me, it's hard to pull this one out for everyday wear!

Mad Men walk-on contest weirdness

Banana Republic is having a photo contest for a walk-on role on the next season of Mad Men. Contestants submit their photos and then people vote for them online. I was tempted to do this, but I'm too lazy and too shy for it. I was perusing the entries, and they seem to me to be divided into three categories:

Authentic

Look--she made an effort--not just the outfit, but the whole room. Kudos!

Why bother?

What the hell? An iPhone, a Girl's Basketball t-shirt, a bland, smug expression in the bathroom mirror plus inadvertently giving me the finger do NOT deserve a walk-on! BOO! You suck!

I'm a Freak

I feel queasy looking at this guy's photo, much less posting in on my blog. This picture says "I am a lunatic who wants to be on TV. What show is this for again?"

It's a Mission: Impossible kind of day

Photos lifted from the DVD Beaver website.

Today I dressed for work in all black & gray, since I wasn't really in the mood to come in, but also because I was thinking about on of my favorite TV shows, the original Mission: Impossible. The third scene of the show (after the taped message and the picking of photos from the IMF dossier) was a gathering of all the agents in Jim Phelps' (Peter Graves) apartment. His place had a near-total black & white color scheme, and the Impossible Mission Force folks always dressed in black, white, and gray for this scene, which gives it a sort of pre-color Wizard of Oz feel, to indicate that the real action isn't happening yet.

When Beebo and I got married, we both wore black and white to the judges' chambers. I'm sure I was semi-consciously thinking of the M:I color scheme when we coordinated, though I'm not sure I told Beebo, since she hadn't seen the show yet.

It's a Mannix kind of day!

Celebrate it...in all your words and actions!

Foulard loves...

..old European grooming products that haven't changed their packaging since the 1970s. They're usually pretty good, are relatively inexpensive, and give me that "George Lazenby as 007" feeling.

Shopportunity

While on vacation in Alabama, we stopped a couple of times at Target ™ stores. For most people, this is a pretty mundane experience, but since we live in the heart of the city and don't have a car, it was a treat for us. I got a pretty major clothing score from Target's new line, Liberty of London. They've licensed some pretty far-out patterns from this famous British store and produced tham at Target prices (i.e. cheap!).
At first, I was fairly amazed to see such bold, flowery designs at such a major discount chain, but apparently, the clothes have been selling out in the first day in places like Manhattan and San Francisco. Fortunately for us, we were shopping in Alabama (Mobile and Foley, to be precise)! So I had the pick of the line. I bought three ties ($17.99 each), three pairs of boxers ($5.99 each), and a really suave fitted dress shirt ($19.99). At the kind of stores I usually have access to in the city, these items will usually cost about three times that amount. (Or even more at the real Liberty of London). Everything I got had a sort of sixties-hipster British psychedelic look, which makes me think of the Beatles' PR man, Derek Taylor, one of my role models of coolness.

My enthusiasm for the patterns may have also been influenced by seeing Elvis' sartorial splendor at Graceland a couple of days earlier.



The prices and the quality of the stuff really points out the big lie that clothes have to be expensive to be good. Hurray for style democracy!

Mem-Phis

We are now in Memphis, staying in and avoiding the St Paddy's day celebration on Beale Street. We had a fun day, though!

First, we drove out of Nashville and ate at the Loveless Cafe,

and then spent a few hours in the car listening to trucking music
and trucking to Memphis. Our hotel is swanky (but we got a good rate), and we've gone out and had barbecue at the Rendezvous restaurant.

We also stopped at the Lansky Bros store in the Peabody Hotel, and Beebo got me a version of this super-cool Elvis jacket from Speedway--a jacket I had long admired in photos. Thanks, Beebo!

Tie Rack

I forgot to include a photo I took of my tie rack in that last post...

Oconomowoc

I've been buying a bunch of cheap vintage ties via Ebay lately, to feed my tie habit. My current quest is silk paisley ties between 2.75" and 3.25" width. I've had a hard time finding these new, even amongst the narrow ties now available in stores.

One I received yesterday (and am currently wearing) was originally bought at a store called The Country Squire, in a place I'd never heard of, Oconomowoc, Wisconsin.

At first, I wondered if the name was a tie-po (gettit?), but then I could tell it was an Indian name, so I was guessing upper New York state, but then I googled it and found the real location.

Then I found this old photo of downtown O, where the Country Squire may have been located, unless it was in a sixties-style suburban shopping development. This was back in the days before everyone bought their clothes at Old Navy, The Gap, and other monolithic national chains. For men's clothes, you'd go to a department store, or a place with a name like The Toggery or Hibberd and Cole.

One of the things that drew me to this particular item was the fact that my name is already on it:

Nifty, huh? (Hand modeling by Beebo)

Cute Couple Alert

Martin Landau and Barbara Bain

Foulard will be back right after this important message...